While the Creators are busy working away on expanding Poptropica and the "New Poptropica" using Unity coming later this year, there haven't been any new islands announced, and it's no wonder that there hasn't been much news in the Poptropica community lately. So basically what I'm saying is, laziness was totally not the reason I went so long between updates on Poptrickia! Totally.

Poptropica now has an official Art Contest! For years, Poptropicans have been making fan art and posting it on sites like deviantart or to fan blogs. But this time, if you like drawing and you love Poptropica, you can send in your work directly to the Creators by tagging it as #PoptropicaArt on social media. On the week of September 5, the Creators will announce the three winners and they'll get free memberships! Here's the official announcement with more details.

Interestingly, most social media sites only allow users who are 13 years or older (which is a rule that everyone totally follows without question, amirite?). On the other hand, Poptropica's stated target audience is ages 6 through 15. The fact that Poptropica is focusing so much on social media these days shows that a large number of Poptropicans today are teenagers who started playing back when they were younger (including myself and most other fan bloggers).

​So, will Poptropica keep changing the theme of its content to match the new audience (as they've been doing in some of the more recent islands), or will they let today's players rotate out and focus in on the newer generation (which is possible, since Monkey Wrench Island is targeted at such players). Only time will tell, but either way, big changes will have to come to Poptropica. I, for one, am equally excited to see it go either way!

Speaking of Monkey Wrench... yes, the guide will be finished soon. It's been low on my priorities lately, since as a tutorial island, it

should be easy enough to figure out given enough time, and

the point is to learn by doing so you can feel the satisfaction of completing other islands without relying too much on my walkthroughs (not that there's anything wrong with seeking help when you're stuck).

But for completeness, yes I will write the guide. Soon.

In other news, the Creators have just introduced something new to the Store: Bronze Cards. They're only here for about a month, so they're featured in the Store. All of them are cards that either were limited to members only during Early Access for an older island, or popular costumes from an older time in Poptropica's history that are being featured again. So get them while you can!

Though, I hope this doesn't mean that these classic costumes will be gone after the month is up; after all, they were still available before the Bronze Cards promo. And, if you don't mind me ranting a little, does anyone else think that bronze is a rather poor choice of color for these cards? They're supposed to look special and expensive and fleeting, but instead the color contrast of the text and background on them is terrible and the "shiny" reflection effect makes them look sightly cheap. I hope they realize this and correct it at least before the promo is over. ​As you can guess, the prices for all of them have been jacked up accordingly, but...

To help you get your hands on these Bronze Cards, there's something new on Home Island: the Daily Spin Wheel! Like many games, this allows you to click on the wheel to spin it and get a randomly selected prize, except you can only spin it once a day. It's meant to encourage people to log in and play every day. Most of the prizes are credits, except for the Grand Prize, which gives you one of the new Bronze Cards, chosen at random. (And if you don't happen to get the Grand Prize, the vast amount of credits you're accruing from the wheel and other recent sources will probably let you buy one directly from the store).

Has anyone else noticed that the spin wheel itself is continuing a Monkey Wrench Island-inspired theme? The fact that it's a ship's wheel, the weathered look, the rope binding it together, all makes it look island-y. Is that the new theme that Poptropica is going for on the Home Island? In case you forgot, the theme that Home (and Realms) has had so far is a sort of Viking-mythology inspired sky-paradise. It would be interesting if the Creators are going to periodically change up the theme of Home Island.

Last but not least, there's a new winner for the Poptropica Hide & Seek competition! Congratulations to Slippery Dragon, who correctly guessed the picture below. Want to know what the answer was, or compete in the next Hide&Seek challenge? Head on over to the Games page now!

As an aside, can you believe that the Hide & Seek contest has been running for five years now? Wow, I feel old ;). You can check out all the previous winners and images that have been featured in the contest by going to the Guess Where I Am blog tag (that's what the contest used to be called before it was briefly interrupted and renamed in 2013). Enjoy, and make sure you participate in the latest round!

Oh, and before I leave another long mega-post: The Poptropica Help Blog is running their annual Poppies award contest! In case you haven't heard of it, it's an awards ceremony for the Poptropica community, and it's in the nominations phase right now. You can vote for your favorite islands, characters, and even favorite fansite! Time is running out, so make sure to fill out the form and nominate Poptrickia for best fansite!

This is Poptrickia, serving you tips, tricks, cheats and more on the awesome game Poptropica for free since 2010! We've got this blog (we call it the Journal), full written walkthroughs for every island and quest in existence, and videos too!